Elizabeth Bird

Fusenews: The Astonishing Socks of M.T. Anderson

Two days late but just as fresh as ever.  The 2009 Cybil Award winners were announced on Valentine's Day. Omnivoracious called them the organic chicken nuggets of the kid-lit world (nope, I don't know what that means either).  SLJ's Rocco Staino even featured them in a piece.  Our little baby is almost all growns up (to quote Swingers).  I have to admit that I am incredibly pleased by all the winners.  From Nic Bishop's Frogs to E. Lockhart to that surprise win by The London Eye Mystery, everything here is good.  My favorite part is where they say who nominated what.  Very fun.  Next year I'll be better prepared.

• Librarians teaching about online content?  My heavens!  Let me grab my soda phosphate, make a mimeograph of my thoughts, and then use two bits to send an express telegram to those who haven't heard!  Actually, I liked the article for the most part.  Particularly the part that talks about All About Explorers.  I use that site in my own Why Google Is Not God presentations with the kiddies.  That and the site meant to Save the Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus.  Remind me to do a post on the Best Fake Websites sometime.  Useful teaching material, it is.

• Serving as a nice tie-in to my recent talk at ComicCon, the Graphic Novel Reporter had a piece up recently called Graphic Novels in Today's Libraries.  Together one children's librarian and two of the YA ilk discuss location, purchasing, and all other bibliographic-type wonders. Thanks to John Shableski for the link.

• You may remember that a week or so ago I posted a small piece that had originally appeared in PW's Children's Bookshelf about an organization called namelos.  Headed by one Stephen Roxburgh I was relatively baffled by the group, because the teeny tiny mention hadn't gone into much detail.  The fuzzy part of my brain that is mostly concerned with shiny objects and smooth round chocolates had the vague unfocused thought that perhaps it would be a good idea to interview Mr. Roxburgh about this group.  Fortunately for all of us Cynthia Leitich Smith is far more on the ball.  In a recent interview with the man in question, Mr. Roxburgh explains what his group is and the services it provides.  It's bound to answer as many questions as it brings up.

• Speaking of Stephens, it is widely known that my agent Stephen Barbara is smart, clever, witty, and a very nice fellow.  But did you also know that he is capable for writing funny articles for Publishers Weekly? I've a very vague sense that I might have linked to this back in November when it first came out, but he wasn't my agent then.  Now he is my agent and everything has changed.  For a delightful take on the bane of competent query letters, check out the piece The Great American Query Letter.

• Speaking of blasts from the past, I don't know how I missed this image on The Imaginary Blog, but now that I've found it I can think of nothing else.  I can sum it up in four words: M.T. Anderson plays Twister.  Scroll down through the post and you'll see what I mean.  Wow.  Even the man's socks are cool.  Is nothing fair?

• With all the upsets in the publishing industry it's hard to figure out how to contact people.  Publishers Weekly has one solution. They've started a feature where they post the contact information of various personages, no matter where they might land. This particular piece is from January 30th, but it's still useful. Thanks to Sheila Ruth for the link.

• Facebook.  It's fun.  It's time consuming.  It's now going to make your content its own.  Behold the New Terms of Service and how they apply to l'il ole you.  Doesn't matter to me much, personally.  Heck, if they want to use that photo of me posing with the Wild Things they are more then welcome to.  It might be problematic for you artistic types, however.  FYI.  Thanks to Sophie Brookover for the link.

• Daily Image:

Hm.  Dunno about this one.  It's called Mark My Time and is meant to be a digital bookmark.  It records the time spent reading as well as "progress".

Looks more like a slap bracelet to me.  They should make a slap bracelet bookmark.  What could possibly go wrong?  Thanks to BoingBoing for the link.

Posted by Elizabeth Bird on February 17, 2009 | Comments (6)